School Pet

Many areas in Korea are fairly dirty, espcially Suwon, where I'm living.  I've actually been told that Suwon is the dirtiest city in all of Korea.  Quite an honor.  Despite there being areas that look like no one has cleaned in 50 years, heaps of garbage around, or lovely old women hocking loogies, you don't see too many rodents.  Actually, I hadn't seen any rodents.  I thought I saw one when I was living in Yeongtong before, but that may have just been a cat.  I'll never know.  

One morning as I was entering school, I noticed a small animal running up the stairs ahead of me, and then it turned and began running down the second floor hallway.  I couldn't really see what it was, but it was pretty big, and had a long tail.  So, I assumed it was a rat.  I work on the third floor, and I think that rats are utterly disgusting, so I ran up the rest of the steps pretty quick and went to my classroom, closing the door behind me.  Our school usually keeps some of the doors on the ground floor open.  After a few days of not seeing the rat, I thought he probably ran outside to play with some of his rat friends and leave me alone.  Wrong.  I was eating lunch one day with the other teachers, of whom none really speak english, and who do I see but that filthy old rat again, running through the teachers lounge.  Before I could point him out to the other teachers, he was gone out the door.  I didn't tell the other teachers about it, not because I dont think they can handle the news that our beloved school has a rat, but because it would probably be pretty hard to explain and I didn't feel like putting in the effort.  

It's been a week since I saw him. My orignal thought about him running out of the school on his on will, doesn't seem very likely.  It's clear that a rat would have a very small brain, but I think that he would be able to realize that our school, being air conditioned would provide him with a better home than the hot, humid, and smoggy outdoor air. It's almost a guarentee that I'll see him again.